I leave you with a traditional folk dance of the Caldari people (The floor is Gallentean Imperialism):
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Someone’s been spiking their Starsi for the occasion.
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Only with vodka, which I think is fitting. It makes it taste like revolution!
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Now I’m a bit interested.
Anyone tried it with rum?
Let’s not hope it tastes like mutiny.
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Though Starsi’s clever use of simile helps sell the product, I doubt anyone really believes the product actually tastes like that. It would be quite the thing if they were ever able to successfully bottle these emotions in a drinkable form, however.
Still, it is fun to imagine your favorite alcohol changing the flavour to alternate emotions. 
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Popular culture is formed by, and informs, popular perception. And perception is its own truth. Once people become convinced of something, and identify with that thing, then trying to convince them otherwise is a challenge to their worldview. Telling them they were fooled, in effect, is telling them they were fools. It makes them feel like you’re saying they weren’t smart enough to see through the lies. They’ll generally reject that, and insist the unpleasant new revelations are the lies.
Perception is more important than reality, because perception shapes popular sentiment, and that can be manipulated to shape reality. Is Person X a murderer? Convince enough people that he is, and the truth doesn’t matter. Even if he never gets convicted, he’ll never get out from under the cloud of it. The rumors will follow him, infecting new groups, requiring him to prove his innocence, again and again (if an active defense, rather than simply ‘they never convicted me’ is even possible).
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what’s true. It only matters what you can convince people to believe. It’s a sad state of affairs, but that’s the human mind for you.
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Thank you, Ms Arrendis. I believe the phenomenon you’re referring to here is the backfire effect, which is the mind’s method of protecting itself from dissonance.
Is Person X a murderer? Convince enough people that he is, and the truth doesn’t matter.
Actually, the truth still matters just not to those people.
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what’s true. It only matters what you can convince people to believe.
Ultimately, I think it does. The trick is convincing people to believe what’s verifiably true when spin is so much easier to mass produce. Getting people to give up unjustified beliefs is possible, but it normally takes a very long time. It can be worth the effort though.
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No, it’s ‘the big lie’. People will believe anything that makes them feel better about themselves. Often this includes things intended to cut down others, so they can rationalize shortcoming as ‘everyone else is just as bad’.
No, it really doesn’t. Once you hit a certain point, the truth is ignored, irrelevant. No matter what you do, attempting to pop the bubble will only push people into a defensive hardening of beliefs. Attempts to act on the ‘truth’ will just get you mocked as a fool.
The real trick is producing verification that itself can’t be faked. Because the spin can be ‘verified’, too. There’s a whole industry devoted to verifying things that were never true, reinforcing fantasies, and clouding the reach of history. It’s called ‘politics’.
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You keep saying it’s something else, yet your description matches closely to the label I used for it. I. Also, isn’t “the big lie” a propaganda technique to ward off any criticism of a claim being incredible? I don’t think that’s what you mean here, but I suppose that “the big lie” could be used to that effectthe effect you’re describing.
Once you hit a certain point, the truth is ignored, irrelevant. No matter what you do,
A certain point in an individual’s beliefs, or in the amount of people in society that believe it? I’m assuming that you mean the latter as my original question was about popular culture being its own truth. I’m going with that, but if I’m making the wrong assumption here please let me know.
No matter what you do, attempting to pop the bubble will only push people into a defensive hardening of beliefs.
Again, since I’m assuming that this is still in response to my original question; yes, sort of. This again sounds like the backfire effect, but not everybody is susceptible to it at the same rate on any given question.
Going back again to the original question though, what it sounds like you’re saying is: popular culture isn’t it’s own truth but it reflects what the people in that society believe to be true, rightly or wrongly.
The real trick is producing verification that itself can’t be faked. Because the spin can be ‘verified’, too. There’s a whole industry devoted to verifying things that were never true, reinforcing fantasies, and clouding the reach of history. It’s called ‘politics’.
Do we not have methods for testing the validity of claims, or to test quality of evidence? Granted, no method is perfect or applicable in all situations, but there should be several tools, that can be used in different situations, to test these things.
Going back to the original question, are you saying that a society would not be likely to question its popular culture because politics is used to reinforce it?
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And that creates the ‘truth’ that they live by, that they record in their histories, and on and on.
Ones that can be quickly and easily applied to popular belief? No, we don’t. Because unless you can actually perform the tests, demonstrate those methods, directly in front of people, break them down into the smallest, most undeniable bits… they won’t believe you.
I’m saying that a society doesn’t question its popular culture and ‘common wisdom’ without a strong, sustained, direct attack on it, and even in the face of one, will cling to what is comfortable and familiar just as long as anyone provides a way to rationalize doing so. Look at the Amarr, for example. A few moments of reflection and self-examination after getting their teeth pushed in by the Jove and having the Minmatar revolt, but then… right back to the same pattern of behavior.
Societies don’t exhibit this tendency because of politics, though. Societies exhibit this tendency because that’s human nature. Politics is just the profession of enabling that.
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Yes. In fact I’ve seen people outright deny the evidence in front of them, undeniable as it was, rather than give up some, usually comfortable, belief.
I’m saying that a society doesn’t question its popular culture and ‘common wisdom’ without a strong, sustained, direct attack on it, and even in the face of one, will cling to what is comfortable and familiar just as long as anyone provides a way to rationalize doing so.
…
Societies exhibit this tendency because that’s human nature. Politics is just the profession of enabling that.
Ah, I see. Thank you for that clarification, Ms. Arrendis.
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There is nothing wrong with liking a soda because it’s what you are used to. Lodovica’s Vitae is a joke outside the Empire, but…I have to wonder? Have the people who make fun of it actually tasted it? It’s perfectly fine! It’s a fizzy drink! It is brown!
There is culture for you I suppose. Having a rotty feeling about sodas other people make, because other people make them.
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Thank you for that very good point, Ms. Qerl. Our cultural preferences are so ingrained that even where something comes from determines its value to us. Should a chemical analysis revealed that the two soft drinks were identical in all respects, the mere fact that one is not part of the other culture’s norm will often mean it’s not seen to be as good as the one from that culture. Sometimes the opposite effect can happen though, the soft drink from the other culture may come to be seen as exotic and highly sought after.
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I myself prefer to view Caldari propaganda as an educational tool, in contrast to, for example, Gallente propaganda, that is used to brainwash listeners. And I myself try to fight gallente propaganda whenever I can spot it - by simply revealing facts, that contradict that propaganda, by bringing reasoning, that contradicts that propaganda, or by simply stating opposite point of view.
Unlike Gallente type of porpaganda, that simply claims settings (like that freedom is good), I contradict them intellectually by statements that have factual basis and that can be proven easily.
Use of visual media only facilitates this approach.
As for the “Culture War”, I believe it is indeed a problem, since it is a gallente way of acting that threatens civilized life in our cluster. Gallente tend to brainwash citizens and attract feeble-minded people by their lies. But that’s not a real war, and I feel sorry for those, who consider it such. Nethertheless, people should be protected from this. And the best weapon against gallente propaganda is truth. Because knowledge is power.
That’s what I am trying to do. Whenever I spot a pro-gallente-ideal statement (like, that freedom is good, and so on), I try to object it. I bring opposite views, I bring arguments, I bring facts. And I hope that people will start thinking. Because when people think, they won’t accept gallente setting as given. And this will mean my work here was done well.
Finally, I would like to address such phenomenon known as “memes”. I believe it is simply an anti-intellectual trend among culturally underdeveloped and undereducated marginal folks. When people bring in meme-filled approach or signify themselves as members of a meme-endorsing group, I try to avoid them, since I prefer to save my time instead of dealing with such sub-mediocrities.
Knowledge and freedom go hand in hand. by spreading your knowledge you are infact spreading freedom of thought, your spreading the freedom to look at something and decide with the audiences’ free will, their freedom that exists in their mind to throw off the chains of cultural norms and see the cluster for what it is. You fight a fight that is essentially a fight for freedom, freedom of existance.
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Diana Kim: Freedom warrior.
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That is actually highly incorrect, Ms. Vess, and I would like to ask you to avoid similar statements, as they attract infamous GalNet “monsters” from capital letter “T”, who just hyperinflate them to absurd levels, due to their sheer inability to contribute to conversation in any meaningful manner. As we can see from the previous poster example, it already began. And claiming that I do something, where I clearly don’t do it? That’s “their” tactics, Ms. Vess. Don’t ever do it again, unless you want to become one of them.
Anyway, what I can’t agree with is that knowledge promotes freedom. Because it is actually quite opposite. I probably have already told you that I’ve graduated with honors the most prestigious academy in the State, so I do know something about the education, and I can speak from my own experience.
The professors there liked to tell, that they are going to “arrange everything to shelves” when they were speaking about the knowledge they were giving us. Because the real, useful knowledge is one that is arranged properly, systematized, grouped. And you don’t even have to remember everything, you just need to realize, where and how to extract the knowledge: how to use the search engines, what exactly to look and where. When we solve a problem, we use a system as well, we build logical connections, use laws and formulas.
I wasn’t the best of the students, mostly because of my discipline problems - and in the State it contributes a lot to the score. But in the field like math, physics, I was succeeding. And my secret was - that I actually understood these principles. I never remembered every law and formula, but when I was realizing that I don’t remember for example a math or physics formula, I simply derived it myself, knowing what this formula is for, what basis does it stand on and how it was obtained. Some professors liked it about me, others hated, but I think that they have taught me properly. Because I know how to use the knowledge, how to use logic and how to obtain missing knowledge if I will need it.
You see, the proper knowledge is the Order, not freedom.
And how would freedom in knowledge look? It would be fragmented knowledge, random unrelated facts, mixed with lies, that you wouldn’t even know how you got them, how to test them. The freedom of thought means your thoughts are uncontrollably disjointed. And it is a symptom of madness.
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Just for clarity’s sake (largely for the off topic thread but I will be addressing a point not mentioned there so here it will go) I was not claiming the Strike Commander was acting in a similar way that was hypocritical, or anything to that nature. I was simply saying that public discourse (as she is at least attempting to do with spreading truth, her perception of things, whatever you wish to call it) is in it of itself pushing free thought and actually isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I already know the response to this statement from many of you. Ignoring the “thats not a discussion that is vitriol” remarks to follow this post for a minute, yes she absolutely does do that just as others do so in kind towards her, sometimes before she even makes any remarks. We have guns for a reason, fight with them since words won’t always bring your point across.
Addressing the freedom vs order part of your reply, I actually can’t argue it. The only thing i can really say to it is that order allows constructive freedom to flourish. Freedom of thought can be destructive or chaotic as you put it but it can also give us things such as hyperdrives and every other technological marvel we have today. Without someone thinking outside of what is established and branching into new ideas we would still be dwelling on our homeworlds throwing rocks at each other. Your not wrong by any means about order and thought, though to me order is the discipline to keep free thought in check and focused. Freedom unfocused is really not a positive thing by any means.
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The trouble with her statement is conflating freedom with chaos. or suggesting that freedom is somehow opposite to order when neither of these things is true.
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Ya, I think the bridge that connects the two is missed. Though I don’t think we can argue that all people think the same.
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